How anybody can draw a connection between expressing the opinion that it's better not to use certain terms, and censorship, is beyond me. Censorship is only an issue when a government is exercising coercion. To express the opinion that use of a term is inappropriate, and to persuade private businesses of journalism and broadcasting to exclude certain terms from usage in their own media voluntarily, has nothing whatever to do with censorship.
My only disagreement is that she didn't merely say, "Hey ya'll, I think this isn't exactly the friendliest way to go about this." She specifically said these words should be banned from the English language. I don't know if I'd call that censorship exactly, I'm not getting into that part of the debate. All I'm saying is it's a bit more than her preference not to use those words.
**Your Nazi comment should be here, but I accidentely deleted it. I agree with this point. The term _____ Nazi is thrown around way too lightly, by myself also. It does really take away from the true evil the Nazi's represent.
What's more, there have always been norms of etiquette and appropriateness of terms. All that changes is what the actual norms are. Now, if people were in danger of being arrested and jailed for use of offending terms, it would make sense to me to say we had a problem. I'm the first to believe in freedom of speech. But freedom of speech does not, and can never, mean freedom from being criticized for one's speech.
I agree. Example: My grandparents were going on a trip, and were at the airport getting their bags. My 88-year-old grandmother, who might i say is the LEAST racist woman on the planet, saw a black man with a uniform who obviously worked at the airport, and yelled to him, "Oh boy! Would you carry these for me?" Obviously my mother was embrassed and apologized, and luckily the man wasn't offended. He understood that, although inappropriate, it was just an illustration of what was unfortunately acceptable in her day and age. Now, on the flip side. I have a black guy friend, who one day, snuck up on me and scared me. I turned around and said, "Oh my God!! Boy you scared the shit out of me!" and no one batted an eye. I obviously wasn't saying "boy" in the same condescending way it was used years ago, even though it was the same word.
"Bastard" is the same. Years ago you would hear people talk about the bastard down the street, meaning the kid who's mother got knocked up before she was married. Nowadays, the bastard down the street is the little kid who threw corn at your house on Mischief Night. It's the same word, completely different meaning.
To eliminate the word completely is ridiculous, especially when it's rarely used in the way that GWL2L is finding offensive.
And I happen to agree that "illegitimate child" is a bad term. I won't favor having you arrested for using it, but I certainly may regard you as a less-than-considerate person for it.
I can certainly see where calling someone "illegitmate" can be offensive. And for that reason, I don't use that expression when referring to a child born out of wedlock. Honestly, it's so common nowadays I wouldn't even differentiate between a child born of wed parents and child born of unwed parents. If I did, I would probably say, "Little Jimmy...yeah...his parents aren't married," and have that be it.
I honestly think that GWL2L is being too sensitive and extreme about the issue. If you don't like to be called those things, request that people don't refer to you that way. But you can't expect the entire language to change because you're sensitive that you were born to unwed parents. Many people, me, Dave2112, Hari and Dussie to name a few, aren't at all sensitive about being born of unwed parents. It's not the 1920s. Shit happens. People really don't care that much anymore.
Luckily, unless your name is Dave or Hari, I didn't invite you..sooo....your response is somewhat unnecessary...not to mention the fact that it was a joke. I didn't attack you or your ridiculous thread, so why don't you back off like a good little girl.
.
